Get Herald RSSIn his Sept. 12 column, "Reactions to the Virginia Tech massacre misplaced," Sean Quigley '10 argues that the prayers that followed the Virginia Tech massacre were "repugnant to reason." Quigley bases his argument on the assumption that supplicative prayer is essentially useless because "the laws of this world are fundamentally unchangeable" and any attempt to change them through prayer is "logically inconsistent" and "highly presumptuous."
Actually, it was entirely appropriate for people to have responded to the Virginia Tech tragedy with prayer - not necessarily to appeal to a higher being, but as a means through which to seek a communal spiritual connection.
Quigley first argues that the Virginia Tech massacre was not surprising because, as a society, we have "destroyed traditional institutions" and consequentially created a world devoid of purpose. He states that this purposeless word has led him not to "dwell on the harsh realities of existence."
Call it optimism or naivete; I believe that the only way to prevent future tragedies is to do exactly the opposite of what Quigley does. We must "dwell on the harsh realities of existence" in order to improve our society and moreover, to prevent such realities from continuing. Human perseverance has emerged victorious throughout numerous struggles and hardships of history. Examples of figures who embody such perseverance are nearly infinite: The Reverend Martin Luther King Jr., Mother Theresa, Gandhi and the like. This spirit was alive and well at the Virginia Tech massacre, as Holocaust survivor Liviu Librescu, a professor at Virginia Tech, courageously and selflessly turned his body into a gunfire shield in order to save the lives of his students.
Our world is not devoid of purpose as Quigley posits, but rather is full of heroism, integrity, unity and love. Librescu, in making the decision to sacrifice himself for his students, probably thought of the love he had for his students rather than thinking that the world was "devoid of purpose" as someone opened fire in his classroom.
Just as Librescu probably had love in mind when he threw himself to the mercy of the shooter's rampage for the sake of his students, empathizers around the world probably had love in their minds when praying for those who lost their lives and loved ones in the Virginia Tech massacre. The reason people prayed in response to Virginia Tech was not in hopes of "the Supreme Being intervening into our affairs and offering solace if a certain number of prayers were offered," as Quigley rhetorically suggests, but rather because it simply made them feel better - for a variety of reasons.
People of religious faith pray. Quigley asks, "What do prayers accomplish?" All possibilities for the existence of a higher being aside, the answer is that prayers unite people through their religious faiths. In times of tragedy, people often seek love and human connection. If prayer is a means by which people can find such love and human connection, then why argue against it?
In one of the many prayers that columnists around the world wrote in response to the Virginia Tech massacre, Rabbi Marc Gellman published a prayer in Newsweek: "In Exodus 19:4 we read that You took us out of Egypt on eagle's wings…Those who watch eagles know that they teach their young to fly by pushing them out of their nests built upon high cliffs and then flying close to them as their chicks fall and flap their untested young wings. When their young fall too far, the eagle parents swoop down, catch their young on their pinion feathers, and flip them upward into the sky to save them from the rocks below and to give them another chance to reach the sky. Eagle parents do catch most of their eagle fledglings…Still, we know that they do not - they cannot - catch them all. Nor can we."
As Gellman strongly implies, our world is certainly not perfect, but it is far from being "devoid of purpose." We simply live in a world of tragic flaws - but it is precisely those tragic flaws that can bring us together and keep us unified in love and mutual understanding. Brown University students were, with few exceptions, unified in mourning for those who died or lost loved ones in the Virginia Tech massacre.
Yet Quigley states his concern for the actions that Brown took in organizing a venue for students to come and express condolences as a student body immediately following the Virginia Tech tragedy. He asks, "If (Brown) feels so compelled to respond to the shootings at Virginia Tech, why does it not respond to the iniquitous behaviors so prevalent on this campus?"
Indeed, the University does seem to organize very few opportunities for students to unify together as a school in a more spiritual context. It is certainly inappropriate to draw parallels between "iniquitous behaviors" undertaken at Brown and the Virginia Tech massacre as Quigley appears to do. However, it would be great if our school gathered more often to express condolences for those in pain, regardless of how minimal or how great such pain might be.
Michael Ramos-Lynch '09 is praying for Sean Quigley '10.
